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Kilpatrick tells Detroit: Let's tackle crime, grime together
'Nobody's coming to save us'
March 14, 2007
Saying it's time for Detroiters to stop blaming outsiders for the city's ills, Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick called on residents Tuesday to take personal responsibility and promised a more focused government that would reduce crime by adding 200 police officers, establish job centers and restore six neighborhoods with an aggressive, five-year plan.
He said he wants to do that and more without raising taxes. In fact, the mayor said he'll cut both property and income taxes, though he would not say how the city, already facing a $96-million deficit, would make up the money.
Kilpatrick made the comments in his sixth State of the City speech at Orchestra Hall with much of his administration and City Council in attendance.
Residents besieged by crime in some of the city's forgotten neighborhoods hope the mayor can make good on his promises.
Mary Abner, 49, who lives on the east side near Davison and 6 Mile, wants to take the mayor's message to heart and hopes her neighbors will, too.
"If he holds up to all that he's talking about, we're rolling," Abner said. "I liked everything about it, especially the part on the neighborhoods and the crime and the kids."
Touching on a tried-and-true mayoral theme hit hard during the administration of Dennis Archer, the mayor strongly took Detroiters to task for the crime ravaging the city. He called on parents to become active in their children's lives, pastors to engage in the neighborhoods where they preach and residents to clean their sidewalks, fix up their homes and reclaim their streets.
"My beloved community, I truly understand the history of African-American people in this country," he said. "But we have come to a point in our community where this is no outside conspiracy doing this to us. This is us killing us. ... And we, as a community, have to stop it now. Nobody's coming to save us."
The more than 2,000 people, including state Sen. Hansen Clarke, D-Detroit, and U.S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, a Detroit Democrat; city appointees, community activists, residents, pastors and business leaders who packed the hall for the invitation-only event cheered the loudest when he called for personal action and laid out his plan to fight crime. They gave him several standing ovations.
Citing that 70% of homicides are narcotics-related, Kilpatrick called on parents to warn their children about the dangers of the thug life.
"We need to help them understand that the so-called glamorous life that they see in some of these videos is not reality," he said.
"We need to help our children understand that, when you get involved in drugs and sitting in a drug house, there's no high-priced champagne, there's no dancing pretty girls, no nice clothes. There's no bling bling. You can get killed."
The number of homicides in the city increased by almost 10% from 2005 and 2006, according to the Police Executive Research Forum, which tracks crime trends in the country.
A significant portion of the mayor's speech focused on an anticrime strategy that calls for hiring 200 police officers to complement the city's 3,100-member force. The mayor said he will augment the force by deploying a SWAT team to patrol areas where there is significant drug dealing or high incidence of robberies and shootings, as well as creating rapid-response units for priority 911 calls.
Patrol officers will be joined by desk officers and commanders, including Police Chief Ella Bully-Cummings, who will be deployed during weekend nights to hot-spot areas, such as nightclubs, party stores and all-night restaurants.
Thomas Wilson Jr., a west-side resident who is president of the Northwestern District Police Community Relations Organization, said the mayor's crime fighting plan did not go far enough to beef up a police department that at its height had more than 5,000 members.
"He's saying he's going to put 200 officers on the street, but you have so many police officers retiring or leaving," Wilson said. "You've got people leaving out the back door of the house and people walking in the front. Does the house ever get full? No.
"It's one thing to tell the chief to take the streets back. It's another to have the manpower to do it," he said.
For all the rhetoric in the mayor's speech, it was still light on the specifics of how he plans to accomplish many of his promises. He has said he will unveil more specifics on funding in coming weeks.
The money issue is critical. Last week, the mayor mentioned a bond initiative he said would fund some of his ideas.
Kilpatrick also announced Tuesday some financial assistance for his Next Detroit Neighborhood Initiative from several foundations and agencies, including the Knight and Skillman foundations.
The mayor said he would address the deficit and the city's fiscal state when he presents his budget plan to the City Council on April 12. He said the current year would end in the black, but he has made that pledge before, and the year-end deficits have always been higher than the mayor estimates.
The mayor also pledged to make workforce development a critical component of his administration, creating programs to help Detroiters in all aspects of job hunting, from preparing resumes and developing employable skills to finding jobs with growth potential.
He said, by year's end, the city's Workforce Development Center will create career centers to help people find jobs in such high-demand industries as health, information technology, construction and retail.
"The only thing this process requires of each participant is personal commitment to be ready to learn and to prepare themselves to work," Kilpatrick said. "That means going to class. That means developing the skills that will make you employable. That means good work habits. And, yes, it means passing the drug test."
He also outlined his plan to transform six city neighborhoods but offered few specifics since announcing the initiative in December.
Meanwhile, he said, the city is working with the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, to develop a strategy over the next three years to assess the buying power in Detroit's neighborhoods in order to attract more businesses.
"They have been very successful in convincing retailers who once said no to a community to actually change their decision and locate in the that community," Kilpatrick said.
"We know Detroiters can shop with the best of them," he said. "And we deserve and have the right to have the best retail in our communities."
At least one mayoral critic, Councilwoman Barbara-Rose Collins, liked what she heard about revitalizing the neighborhoods and even pledged to help him find the funding.
"I thought he was right on target," she said. "I'll do my part to help him find the money."
Contact MARISOL BELLO at 313- 222-6678 or bello@freepress.com. Staff writers Kathleen Gray and Suzette Hackney contributed.
Copyright © 2007 Detroit Free Press Inc.
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